Please help.

[masako]

I am in the process of revamping Kala's grammar. I'm not nearly as versed in syntax as I need to be. My aim is for Kala to be head-final, SOV, NOM-ACC. The following is an example of what has me stumped. Please feel free to snicker at my horrible newbness. Almost inexcusable given how long I have been a ZBBer.

na mita-n anya
1sg dog see
I see (the/a) dog.

mita ina
dog eat
(The/a) dog eats.

mita yempa-n tahe
dog table-ACC be.under
(The/a) dog is under (the/a) table.

mita yempa-n tahe ina
dog table-ACC be.under eat
(The/a) dog eats under (the/a) table.

na mita-n tahe yempa ina anya
1sg dog-ACC under table eat see
I see (the/a) dog eat under (the/a) table.

na mita-n tahe yempa ina-nko anya
1sg dog-ACC under table eat-PROG see
I see (the/a) dog eating under (the/a) table.

na mita-n ueso tahe yempa ina-nko anya
1sg dog-ACC bone under table eat-PROG see
I see (the/a) dog eating (the/a) bone under (the/a) table.

na mita-n maloha ueso tahe yempa ina-nko anya
1sg dog-ACC brown-AUG bone under table eat-PROG see
I see (the/a) dark brown dog eating (the/a) bone under (the/a) table.

So, I'm lost in explaining what happens to "bone", are "be dark brown" and "under" operating as serial verbs? Are prepositions even a thing in a head-final SOV lang? Do I need a indirect object marker? Please help.

Thank you in advance.

[Jonlang]

I am by no means an expert on anything linguistic, but seeing as this thread has had 13 views and no replies, I'll chip in. Someone, anyone, please feel free to tell me if I'm talking rubbish here.

I think that head-final langs are more prone to postpositions rather than prepositions (but I'm sure there's an exception to the rule somewhere). I don't see a reason for your sentence to put both verbs (eat and see) together at the end – I'm not sure it's clear who is performing which verb. To me, it looks as though it should read something like:

I (the/a) dog brown see (a/the) bone table under eat.

But I can't say why that looks right to me (unhelpful, I know). I'm probably wrong, but it'll be interesting to find out why when someone else comes along.

[Hallow XIII]

It sort of depends on the way other sentences work in Kala, but I think "dark brown" here just modifies "dog". Prepositions are absolutely a thing, although most SOV languages like this have postpositions (this seems to be the way Kala works too, from these few examples).

"Serial verb" is a bit of an ill-defined term. I would say that whether you'd want to call these constructions "serial verbs" is how phrases with them operate in different contexts. Your basic options for what kind of element "under the table" here might present are a chained predicate and a peripheral adjunct. The main difference here is that the former is much more discourse-salient, something like: "I see that the dog is under the table and eating a bone". The latter pretty much corresponds to the translation you gave. Purely syntactically, you could distinguish between the two by asking about the scope of e.g. negation: a chained predicate would usually be able to be negated separately, while a constituent of the clause periphery usually cannot. "Serial verbs" in many of the languages that have them, however, can be used for both types of construction, so if the syntax here is the same as for a chain of events that would be a good reason to call these constructions "serial verbs".

For looking at the syntactic status of "dark brown" here, you might want to ask some other questions, like: can tahe yempa occur as a noun modifier? For example, what about "the dog under the table"? If constructing that phrase requires different morphology or word order, you might prefer to analyze the occurrences of maloha in your example sentences as predicates serialized with the main verb at the end. On the other hand, if not, you might wish to regard it as a relative or other noun-modifying clause.

Finally, for "bone", that depends on what that word behaves like in a simple clause. How would you say "I ate a bone", or "I eat a bone"?

[masako]

I (the/a) dog brown see (a/the) bone table under eat.

But I can't say why that looks right to me (unhelpful, I know). I'm probably wrong, but it'll be interesting to find out why when someone else comes along.

Fair enough. What you have looks correct when I think about it in Kala, but I'll let it simmer for a bit.

"Serial verb" is a bit of an ill-defined term. I would say that whether you'd want to call these constructions "serial verbs" is how phrases with them operate in different contexts. Your basic options for what kind of element "under the table" here might present are a chained predicate and a peripheral adjunct. The main difference here is that the former is much more discourse-salient, something like: "I see that the dog is under the table and eating a bone". The latter pretty much corresponds to the translation you gave. Purely syntactically, you could distinguish between the two by asking about the scope of e.g. negation: a chained predicate would usually be able to be negated separately, while a constituent of the clause periphery usually cannot. "Serial verbs" in many of the languages that have them, however, can be used for both types of construction, so if the syntax here is the same as for a chain of events that would be a good reason to call these constructions "serial verbs".

OK, so if I understand all of that, yes, what I have is more-or-less a "serial verb" construction?

can tahe yempa occur as a noun modifier? For example, what about "the dog under the table"?

Well, "the dog under the table" would be mita yempa-n tahe - DOG TABLE-ACC BE.UNDER

Finally, for "bone", that depends on what that word behaves like in a simple clause. How would you say "I ate a bone", or "I eat a bone"?

na ueso-n ina-ye
1sg bone-ACC eat-PST

just remove "-ye" for the latter example

Thank you both, very much.

[Vardelm]

OK, so if I understand all of that, yes, what I have is more-or-less a "serial verb" construction?

Based on my understanding, I would say "yes", mostly since tahe "under" can be used as a verb in its own right and it appears after the patient, next to the main verb, and not next to the agent.

If you want Kala to be head-final, then I would expect adjectives to come before their head noun. So you would have:

na maloha mita-n ueso tahe yempa ina-nko anya
1sg brown-AUG dog-ACC bone under table eat-PROG see
I see (the/a) dark brown dog eating (the/a) bone under (the/a) table.


Maybe you are viewing "adjectives" as another verb type, such that maloha could be used as a main verb, like in "the dog is brown". That would maybe argue for "adjectives" to follow the noun the are describing.


For a translation like "the dog that is under the table is eating a bone", I'd look for "under the table" to appear before "dog".

For "the dog is eating a bone that is under the table, I'd think "under the table" would come before "bone".

Given where "under the table" appears here (right before the verb & after the agent & patient", I'd give a very picky translation as "the dog is eating a bone and this is happening under the table".

All those orders are probably dependent more on how you want Kala to work than what is "correct".

I hope that makes sense, and I hope even more that it's helpful.

[Hallow XIII]

What conditions the selection of the accusative case?

[zompist]

na mita-n maloha ueso tahe yempa ina-nko anya
1sg dog-ACC brown-AUG bone under table eat-PROG see
I see (the/a) dark brown dog eating (the/a) bone under (the/a) table.

You've got a lot of unmarked subordination going on here. Semantically, you have something like

see( I, dog [eat( dog, location:under table) ] )

Subordination doesn't have to be marked, but it does clarify things. In Quechua (which is SOV), you'd use a separate verb form, based on a participle. So the gloss for this sentence would be

Ñuqa misa-pi tullu-ta miku-q allqu-ta ri-ni.
I table-LOC bone-ACC eat-ing dog-ACC see-1s

(Explicitly including 'I' would be done only for contrastive reasons. Also, I'm leaving out evidentials.)

Note that the entire subclause (misapi tulluta mikuq) is subordinate to "dog", so it appears before it. If it were a separate sentence it would be

Allqu misapi tulluta miku-n.
dog table-LOC bone-ACC eat-3s

but "dog" isn't repeated.

You could also include an explicit subordinator. In Biblical Hebrew, or in Akkadian, you'd have "dog SUB eat"— the subordinate clause follows its head. In Mandarin (which can be SOV) it'd be "eat SUB dog".

[masako]

Maybe you are viewing "adjectives" as another verb type, such that maloha could be used as a main verb, like in "the dog is brown". That would maybe argue for "adjectives" to follow the noun the are describing.

Yes, there are no "adjectives" in Kala, verbs can be "attributive" or "stative".

For a translation like "the dog that is under the table is eating a bone", I'd look for "under the table" to appear before "dog".

This is helpful and makes a lot of sense.

All those orders are probably dependent more on how you want Kala to work than what is "correct".

Right, which is the genesis of this thread. I'm trying to establish a more comprehensive idea of 'how I want Kala to work' than what I already have. And you all are helping me immensely.

I hope that makes sense, and I hope even more that it's helpful.

Very much so, yes!

What conditions the selection of the accusative case?

The dog being seen by "1sg".

You've got a lot of unmarked subordination going on here. Semantically, you have something like

That's what my gut told me, but I'm lost in how to mark it accurately.

Ñuqa misa-pi tullu-ta miku-q allqu-ta ri-ni.
I table-LOC bone-ACC eat-ing dog-ACC see-1s

This! This is what I need(ed)! natlang examples that closely resemble my goal. Thank you.

You could also include an explicit subordinator. In Biblical Hebrew, or in Akkadian, you'd have "dog SUB eat"— the subordinate clause follows its head.

That is interesting. I had not thought of a subordinating particle...I'll think on it.

[Kuchigakatai]

What conditions the selection of the accusative case?

The dog being seen by "1sg".

He meant to ask what are all the conditions under which a noun is in the accusative, as opposed to not-accusative. Not just the condition of that one sentence.

In the sentence you're asking about in the first post, ueso 'bone' seems to be the direct object of ina-nko 'eat-PROG' (as suggested by your sentence na ueso-n ina-ye). If it is in fact a direct object, how come it doesn't have accusative case?

Taking some guesses in the dark, is it because there can only be one noun marked as an accusative in an entire noun phrase of the main clause? Is it because ueso is separated from ina-nko, but if I put them next to each other, I'd get na mita-n maloha ueso-n ina-nko anya 'I see a dark brown dog eating the bone.ACC'?

[Vardelm]

Very much so, yes!

Excellent! I'm glad!

Please feel free to snicker at my horrible newbness. Almost inexcusable given how long I have been a ZBBer.

You're not the only one! I suspect many of us on the ZBB feel that way about at least one aspect of conlanging. Personally, I feel like my phonologies are lacking. On the + side, if we were all master linguists who could pull a quality speedlang out of our arse whenever we liked, there wouldn't be nearly as much need for places like the ZBB, which would be quite a loss.

[akam chinjir]

Are prepositions even a thing in a head-final SOV lang? Do I need a indirect object marker?

There's Germanic. But your preposition seems also to be a verb with OV order, so having it switch seems strange to me. (To be honest when I first read mita yempa-n tahe, I just assumed you had a null existential copula, and tahe was a postposition.)

[masako]

He meant to ask what are all the conditions under which a noun is in the accusative, as opposed to not-accusative. Not just the condition of that one sentence.

Ah. That makes sense. Yeah, so, the ACC marks the recipient of an action, hence mita-n is being seen.

In the sentence you're asking about in the first post, ueso 'bone' seems to be the direct object of ina-nko 'eat-PROG' (as suggested by your sentence na ueso-n ina-ye). If it is in fact a direct object, how come it doesn't have accusative case?

An oversight on my part...but also confusion. In my last sentence, can both the bone and the dog be marked for ACC, wouldn't that cause a mix-up of which is receiving which action?

I'd get na mita-n maloha ueso-n ina-nko anya 'I see a dark brown dog eating the bone.ACC'?

Ah...now, I see it.

There's Germanic. But your preposition seems also to be a verb with OV order, so having it switch seems strange to me. (To be honest when I first read mita yempa-n tahe, I just assumed you had a null existential copula, and tahe was a postposition.)

Well, that *is* the case. tahe is "[to be] under; below; down", a stative verb.

I have a "to be; exist; yes" but it is primarily used for emphasis, or to answer polar questions.

EDIT:

I think the simplest resolution might be to simply have two separate clauses joined by a conjunction:

na mita-n maloha yempa-hue anya ku ha ueso-n ina-nko
1sg dog-ACC brown-AUG table-LOC see CONJ 3sg bone-ACC eat-PROG
I see (the/a) dark brown dog at (the/a) table and he is eating (the/a) bone.

[bradrn]

In the sentence you're asking about in the first post, ueso 'bone' seems to be the direct object of ina-nko 'eat-PROG' (as suggested by your sentence na ueso-n ina-ye). If it is in fact a direct object, how come it doesn't have accusative case?

An oversight on my part...but also confusion. In my last sentence, can both the bone and the dog be marked for ACC, wouldn't that cause a mix-up of which is receiving which action?

Well, assuming that sentence is using unmarked subordination as zompist suggested, I think the most likely marking would be something like this:

na [mita ueso-n tahe yempa ina-nko] anya
1sg [dog bone-ACC under table eat-PROG] see
I see (the/a) dog eating (the/a) bone under (the/a) table.

Where mita ueso-n tahe yempa ina-nko is a separate clause, so its subject mita gets nominative and object ueso gets accusative. If you want mita to be in the accusative, I suppose you could do some sort of raising-to-object type thing to get:

na [mita-n ueso-n tahe yempa ina-nko] anya
1sg [dog-ACC bone-ACC under table eat-PROG] see
I see (the/a) dog eating (the/a) bone under (the/a) table.

Where mita-n is part of the subordinate clause, but gets case-marking as if it were part of the main clause. I believe this is what English does in sentences like I saw [him looking at her], which similarly has two pronouns in the accusative. But I don’t know enough about this topic to give any more details about how this works.

However, under the assumption that this is using unmarked subordination, I don’t see any obvious way to get your original case-marking:

na [mita-n ueso tahe yempa ina-nko] anya
1sg dog-ACC bone under table eat-PROG see
I see (the/a) dog eating (the/a) bone under (the/a) table.

Where the subject mita is accusative but the object ueso is nominative. I dunno, it could be possible that there is no object marking in subordinate clauses but subjects undergo raising, or this could be analysed as some sort of serial verb construction where ina-nko anya acts as a divalent predicate, but that’s getting a bit too far from what I’m familiar with, so I can’t comment any further on how plausible those options are.

[Vardelm]

I have found it helpful to start with stupidly simple sentence examples and work up from there. So:

na mitan anya

na

1sg

mita-n

dog-ACC

anya

see

I see (the/a) dog.


Is this correct? Is the -n suffix for the accusative is used for the patient and/or recipient?

If true, then that leads to questions on how to handle the rest of the content.

1) When ueson tahe yempa inanko "eating a bone under the table" is added to mitan "dog-ACC", does that require mitan to have the ACC suffix removed so that it appears in the nominative?

Then, handle the subordinate/relative/whatever-you-call-it clause separately. Add in the next bit.

na mitan ueson inanko anya

na

1sg

mita-n

dog-ACC

ueso-n

bone-ACC

ina-nko

eat-PROG

anya

see

I see (the/a) dog eating (the/a) bone.

2) For this relative clause ueson inanko "eating a bone", do you want ueso "bone" to appear in the accusative or not? Either way is probably fine. Personally, I would say "yes". Ueson "bone-ACC" would be marked for the next verb to appear: inanko "eating". I almost think of it as a sort of stack. Once the next verb appears, that recipient/patient in the accusative and its head verb are "used up", so to speak. That means the previous noun in the accusative - mitan "dog-ACC" will be the patient for the following verb - anya "see" - unless another noun in the accusative appears before.

3) Where should the relative clause appear? I think I said above that I would expect such clauses - since they are describing or limiting which dog is being talked about - to appear before mitan "dog". I think relative clauses might be a bit squirrely in that they can very easily appear before or after their head noun. They don't follow the same rules of pure adjectives and adpositions as uniformly with regards to the language's overall syntax.


Last bit:

4) Where do you want tahe yempa "under (the/a) table" to appear in the sentence? It's current location seems fine.

5) Do you want prepositions or postpositions? (I think this was mentioned previously.) In a head-final, SOV language, one would expect postpositions, so the phrase here would be yempa tahe "table under".

6) Do you want the object of pre-/post-positions to be marked or not? Again, either way is fine.


If you run through that exercise, I think you can decide in a relatively organized, simple manner how you want the language to operate. At least, this is how I have approached syntax, which is in a very mechanical, almost programming-esque way. Start simple, build up, and keep your sanity. Some of this might be redundant with the other posts above, but break it down into steps seemed useful to illustrate.

[Kuchigakatai]

In the sentence you're asking about in the first post, ueso 'bone' seems to be the direct object of ina-nko 'eat-PROG' (as suggested by your sentence na ueso-n ina-ye). If it is in fact a direct object, how come it doesn't have accusative case?

An oversight on my part...but also confusion. In my last sentence, can both the bone and the dog be marked for ACC, wouldn't that cause a mix-up of which is receiving which action?

It sounds like you have the answer to your question there, it was just a bit of oversight.

I'm sure lots of languages with case would allow dog and bone being to be both marked as accusative here. It's not a problem at all, because languages with case usually rely on a combination of case, word order, pragmatics (what makes sense in the real world: a bone doesn't normally eat a dog), and agreement (like when verbs agree with their subject), the context of the specific situation, and maybe even further syntax rules (like adding extra unstressed pronouns next to the verb) to tell apart these types of potential ambiguities. They don't just do pure case.

The following is a valid main clause in Latin:

Panem mē edere!
bread.ACC 1SG.ACC eat.INF

It ambiguously means 'I ate the bread!' and 'The bread ate me!', but the former is a much more likely candidate.

[bradrn]

The following is a valid main clause in Latin:

Panem mē edere!
bread.ACC 1SG.ACC eat.INF

It ambiguously means 'I ate the bread!' and 'The bread ate me!', but the former is a much more likely candidate.

That’s interesting — I didn’t know Latin could allow two accusative nouns in a clause. Under what conditions can that happen? And is there any semantic difference between that and the equivalent sentence with ‘bread’ in the nominative?

[masako]

Well, assuming that sentence is using unmarked subordination as zompist suggested, I think the most likely marking would be something like this:

na [mita ueso-n tahe yempa ina-nko] anya
1sg [dog bone-ACC under table eat-PROG] see
I see (the/a) dog eating (the/a) bone under (the/a) table.

Where mita ueso-n tahe yempa ina-nko is a separate clause, so its subject mita gets nominative and object ueso gets accusative. If you want mita to be in the accusative, I suppose you could do some sort of raising-to-object type thing to get:

na [mita-n ueso-n tahe yempa ina-nko] anya
1sg [dog-ACC bone-ACC under table eat-PROG] see
I see (the/a) dog eating (the/a) bone under (the/a) table.

Where mita-n is part of the subordinate clause, but gets case-marking as if it were part of the main clause. I believe this is what English does in sentences like I saw [him looking at her], which similarly has two pronouns in the accusative. But I don’t know enough about this topic to give any more details about how this works.

Thanks, you've given me some things to think about.

Is this correct? Is the -n suffix for the accusative is used for the patient and/or recipient?

Yes, spot on.

1) When ueson tahe yempa inanko "eating a bone under the table" is added to mitan "dog-ACC", does that require mitan to have the ACC suffix removed so that it appears in the nominative?

That's what I am trying to establish...a pattern that "fits" and is (somewhat) natural.

3) Where should the relative clause appear? I think I said above that I would expect such clauses - since they are describing or limiting which dog is being talked about - to appear before mitan "dog". I think relative clauses might be a bit squirrely in that they can very easily appear before or after their head noun. They don't follow the same rules of pure adjectives and adpositions as uniformly with regards to the language's overall syntax.

This. This is what I needed to hear...what I was unable to articulate in my OP.

Some of this might be redundant with the other posts above, but break it down into steps seemed useful to illustrate.

It's absolutely exquisite in its simplicity and helpfulness. Thank you.

I'm sure lots of languages with case would allow dog and bone being to be both marked as accusative here. It's not a problem at all, because languages with case usually rely on a combination of case, word order, pragmatics (what makes sense in the real world: a bone doesn't normally eat a dog), and agreement (like when verbs agree with their subject), the context of the specific situation, and maybe even further syntax rules (like adding extra unstressed pronouns next to the verb) to tell apart these types of potential ambiguities. They don't just do pure case.

I hadn't thought of it in that way. What you say makes sense. I guess, for me, I'm just trying to explain ""the most correct"" way in the grammar, and then include bits similar to what you describe.

[Richard W]

That’s interesting — I didn’t know Latin could allow two accusative nouns in a clause. Under what conditions can that happen? And is there any semantic difference between that and the equivalent sentence with ‘bread’ in the nominative?

The most obvious is verbs with an object of person and an object of thing - 'to teach' is the most obvious, but there is also the verb 'to conceal'. Presumably one could write, Presbyter uxorem regem celavit - 'The priest concealed his wife from the king'. There are also factitive verbs, which can for example have an accusative for person affected and for the post.

The example you have been given is the accusative and infinitive, which I internalised as a sort of factitive. Mostly there is no alternative to an accusative and infinitive, but some time there is such as Me panem edere gaudes and Gaudes quod (ego) panem edo 'You rejoice that I am eating the bread'. The semantic difference, if any, is very subtle. Note that the first, with two accusatives in the 'clause', has an infinitive, not a finite verb in the clause.

Some of the differences seem to be purely lexical. 'You have commanded me to eat the bread' has two accusatives and an infinitive if one uses iubeo but if one uses impero it has nominative, accusative, and finite verb in the subjunctive. At school we were advised to choose 'iubeo' in such a case.

[HazelFiver]

I don't have much advice here, but:

Are prepositions even a thing in a head-final SOV lang?

There are a handful of SOV languages with prepositions and at least two languages that have prepositions and are probably head-final (relative clauses and adjectives before nouns). At least one (Tigré) has all these properties.

[Richard W]

It seems you can add Pali to the list - AN, relative clauses before antecedent, and prepositions. Now, there are some tatpurushas whose second element is semantically similar to a postposition. but you’d have to add a 'bare stem' case to make them count as postpositions. Prepositions are not prominent in the system.